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Well, the New York Hi-Fi wingding has come and gone once again, and now is the time when audio editors dutifully adopt the role of oracle, divining the future of high fidelity, and generally sketching out The Big Picture for those of us too blind to see the graffiti on the wall. So, who are we to shirk our duty? Herewith, The Stereophile's audio observations and predictions for 1965.

Munich High End, an audio show so big that it claims representation from 95% of high-end brands worldwide, opens this week in Munich's MOC Convention Center. The show opens on May 5, which intentionally coincides with Germany's annual Ascension Day holiday, with a "Press and Industry Day" whose attendance is so large as to be mind-boggling. Then, from May 6–8, Munich High End opens its doors to thousands upon thousands of "the public" from 10am–6pm.

Some jazz musicians whose albums I've recently praised in this space are playing in New York jazz clubs these next couple of weeks . . .

Kenny Barron's Book of Intuition (on the revived Impulse! label) is an infectiously joyous album, bursting with riffs and vamps and sparkling chords over head-swaying melodies, some infused with a Latin tinge, others crooning with lyrical balladry, all of them propelled by a forceful forward motion, whatever the tempo.

This is a story about vulgar words and what is likely one of the most innovative and exciting, yet self-consciously idiosyncratic, audio components of the 21st century: Schiit Audio's Ragnarok integrated amplifier ($1699).

I never use vulgar words—at least not in public. I rarely use the word shit as an adjective, a verb, or a noun. Therefore, when I first heard of an audio company founded by legendary audio engineer Mike Moffat (formally of Theta) and award-winning science-fiction author and audio polymath Jason Stoddard—a company named Schiit—I could permit myself to pronounce its name only as Shite. I thought it made me sound British instead of rude.

Saturday April 30 and Sunday May 1, at 11am, Alma Music and Audio (5759 La Jolla Blvd., La Jolla, CA 92037) will be celebrating its one-year anniversary with a special "Music Talks" event featuring darTZeel and Evolution Acoustics products. Guests will include darTZeel's Hervé Deletraz and Jonathan Tinn and Kevin Malmgren, the team behind Evolution Acoustics.

I still remember how difficult it was for me to transition from mass-market to high-end audio. The former, for all its flaws, gave me things to do: switches to flip, buttons to push, knobs to turn, meters to watch. I was in control—and if my attention happened to stray from the music or the liner notes, I still had something to keep me busy. By contrast, the first perfectionist-quality amplifier I bought—an Amber Series 70—was an oblong box with an on/off switch. Where's the fun in that?